... Its only forerunner was Charles Tomlinson's slim volume of 1960.
This contained poems of great distinction by an eminent poet, but there was
more of Tomlinson in them than Tyutchev. What is more, Frank Murtagh has
translated more poems than any other author, several for the first time into
English, including some of the much neglected political pieces.
This book has been interestingly illustrated by Shaheen Razvi. Certain
of the illustrations do not present the poems in the way in which some
people might have visualised them, but they are nevertheless a bold break
with the pretty-pretty presentation of anthological pieces hitherto
dominant.
All in all, I believe that Frank Murtagh's book is essential reading
for students and other readers of Russian poetry and is to be warmly
recommended.
R. Lane
University of Durham, England
February, 1983
Since R. Lane wrote his Foreword in 1983, only one edition of "quality"
translations of Tyutchev has appeared till now, Anatoly Liberman's versions
of 181 of the poems published in 1991. In calling them "quality"
translations, I make a deliberate value judgement, for his is not the only
edition of selected poems to have appeared.
There are too many gaps in published Tyutchev scholarship for any one
researcher to deal with. The present book is intended to be the first of
several of various lengths and formats which I wish to produce as time
allows and whose overall aim is to fill some of these gaps. I shall also
continue to work at the translations of the poems. I am all too aware of the
defects of several of my versions, although I hope they are at least
accurately rendered, even if they do little justice to Tyutchev. Very little
has been published in English about his personal letters. There has been no
serious attempt to translate them in bulk, possibly because the task would
be monumental...
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